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After the Circus, Consider Your Options

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Libertarian Party Logo
Libertarian Party Logo (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Maybe I don’t get out enough, but among people I’ve talked with about next year’s presidential election there’s a deep feeling of disgust. Watching the Republicans debate and the Democrats speechify, their feeling so far is “Really? We can’t do any better than these clowns?”

I feel their pain — and, I suspect, yours too. I wouldn’t leave my wallet alone in a room with any of the guys or gals running for president on a “major party” ticket. But then, I usually feel that way.

What’s changing is that more and more people are agreeing with me. Since 2004, according to Gallup, the percentage of Americans who think we need a “third party” has risen from 40% to as high as 60%. The percentage of Americans who think the Republicans and Democrats do an “adequate” job has fallen from 56% to 35%.

So, enjoy the circus for now, I guess, but as Donald Trump pedals his giant tricycle around and Hillary Clinton juggles disappearing email servers, keep the “third party” thing in mind …. and don’t forget that there already IS a third party working hard to earn your support.

The Libertarian Party boasts 152 currently serving elected public officials, ranging from city council members to fire and water district representatives.

The party has yet to elect a governor, congressmember or president, but not for lack of trying. The first woman to receive an electoral vote wasn’t Geraldine Ferraro; it was the Libertarian Party’s first vice-presidential nominee, Tonie Nathan, in 1972. The party has elected hundreds of local officials and a few state representatives. It’s clearly a serious political player. If you’re unhappy with the “major party” offerings, why not take a closer look?

Darryl W. Perry, Cecil Anthony Ince and Marc Feldman have already declared for the Libertarian Party’s 2016 presidential nomination. Rumor has it that the elephant in the room (pun intended — he’s the former Republican governor of New Mexico), Gary Johnson, may throw his hat in the Libertarian ring again and try to top his 2012 total of 1.6 million votes.

Pay attention. Explore. If you’re not a libertarian, check out the Greens, the Constitution Party, heck, even the Prohibition Party. There ARE alternatives to the “major party” freak show.

Or you can keep on doing what you’ve always done and get what you’ve always got. Because that’s worked so well in the past, right?

Thomas L. Knapp is director and senior news analyst at the William Lloyd Garrison Center for Libertarian Advocacy Journalism (thegarrisoncenter.org). He lives and works in north central Florida.

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It’s Classified: A Tale of Two Scofflaws

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RGBStock.com Prison Photo

For the crime of telling America and the world about the lawlessness of the American political class — including one Hillary Rodham Clinton — Chelsea Manning is now a political prisoner, serving a 35-year sentence at Fort Leavenworth’s US Disciplinary Barracks, after a show trial which violated nearly every basic benchmark of American justice.

For her crimes and misdeeds — including, since Manning’s day in kangaroo court, the discovery that she, too, was compromising classified information by running her official email through an illegal, unsecure “private” email server — the same Hillary Rodham Clinton’s punishment has, so far, been limited to a slow, agonizing fall from political grace.

This week, Manning once again finds herself in the news. She faces solitary confinement as punishment for a variety of “offenses” so minor that it’s nearly impossible to call them “offenses” with a straight face. The highlight: She is accused of possessing a tube of toothpaste that’s past its expiration date (I could be wrong here, but isn’t toothpaste in prison dispensed to inmates BY the prison?).

This week, Clinton once again finds herself in the news. She faces further drubbings in the pre-primary polls as punishment for getting caught lying, yet again, about her illegal handling of classified information. In New Hampshire, she now trails avowed socialist Bernie Sanders, who even a year ago would have been considered an interesting gadfly candidate at best, in the race for the Democratic Party’s 2016 presidential nomination.

I find it painful to compare Chelsea Manning to Hillary Clinton.

Chelsea Manning is an American heroine who knowingly exposed classified information for the purpose of revealing war crimes in Iraq and other government lawlessness, including Clinton’s orders to her State Department underlings to bug the offices of UN diplomats.

Hillary Clinton is a power-monger who carelessly exposed classified information because she believes she’s above the law. Like the late Richard Nixon, on whose impeachment papers she worked as a young congressional staffer, she believes that if  Hillary Clinton does it, it’s not illegal.

I probably owe Ms. Manning an apology for linking her name with that of a disreputable figure like Clinton. But, dissimilar as they are, it seems to me that the solution to both their problems is the same: They should both get out.

Chelsea Manning should get out of prison.

Hillary Clinton should get out of politics.

How’s that for a win-win solution?

Thomas L. Knapp is director and senior news analyst at the William Lloyd Garrison Center for Libertarian Advocacy Journalism (thegarrisoncenter.org). He lives and works in north central Florida.

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Supporting the Garrison Center’s Work: How and Why

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The William Lloyd Garrison Center for Libertarian Advocacy Journalism is not an “organization” per se. We’re not registered with any government as a “non-profit.” Donations are not tax-deductible … in fact, since we’re not really an organization, we don’t accept donations at all. But our people do. And the “we” is really more of an “I.”

Hi, I’m Tom Knapp, “director and senior news analyst” at the Center. Which means that I write most of the Center’s content, maintain the web site, submit our content to newspapers, etc. When someone else writes an op-ed for the Center, I pay the author out of my own pocket (I’d like to do more of that, but that requires having, you know, money). So the way to “support the Center” is to “support Tom.”

A quick lowdown on the “how” before I get to the “why”: I accept donations through my blog, KN@PPSTER. Over on the right, near the top, you’ll find four options (Patreon, PayPal, Bitcoin and Litecoin) for contributing. Here’s a screen shot to help you find your way:

Support KN@PPSTER

 

 

Now, the big question: Why should you support me? Simple: Because I get the job done. And when it comes to bang for buck, my work stacks up favorably versus think tanks with multi-million dollar annual budgets.

What is the job? Outreach. Writing libertarian op-eds and getting them published in “mainstream” and non-libertarian political media. That’s what I do. I’ve written hundreds, and placed thousands, of op-eds in those publications.

How can you tell I get the job done? Browse the site. At the bottom of each op-ed, you’ll find a list of publications in which that op-ed has appeared. Right now, I’m successfully placing Garrison op-eds 40-60 times per month in newspapers and on political sites across the US and around the world. Small-town dailies. Community weeklies. Large and prestigious newspapers. National and international news and political magazines.

My bare-bones financial nut for continuing to make this happen is $250 a month. At $500 a month, I would probably be able to go from three to four op-eds per week (with at least one per week written by an “outside author”) and start pushing toward the 100 mark with respect to getting libertarian material “out there” to the people who need it most. People outside the libertarian movement. You know, Joe and Jill Sixpack. The people we need to reach. The people we need to persuade.

Thanks to an angel donor who wishes to remain anonymous, that $250 per month came in, guaranteed, for six months. Said donor just extended for another three, which gets us to November.

Come hell or high water, I intend to keep the Center a going concern through the end of the year. If it’s not carrying its own weight by then, minus the single angel, I’ll decide the market has spoken and go do something else.

But this is me speaking to the market — to you, the libertarian who wants to spread our message far and wide, cost-effectively. At 50 media pickups per month and $250 in revenue, that’s $5 to place a libertarian op-ed in front of a non-libertarian audience. Sounds like a bargain to me. If you think so too, please help me keep making it happen.

Yours in liberty,
Tom Knapp